Religion and Belief in British Public Life

The Woolf Institute at Cambridge University (it is named for the former Lord Chief Justice, Lord Harry Woolf) set up in 2013 a commission to examine the place of religion and belief in British public life.

In my evidence to the Commission I deal with the nature of religion and belief and its peculiarities as a strand in the law on equality and non-discrimination, the changes that mark and have affected its place in British society over recent decades, and the way law deals with religion and belief.  In this there is a section on secularism, one on religion and intolerance, and an examination of several aspects of the law concerning religion and belief in employment, including a rejection of the suggestion of a right to “reasonable accommodation” in favour of reliance on the present law on indirect discrimination.  The final section deals with religion in schools.